


recognition

by youcouldmakealife



Series: between the teeth [28]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-13
Updated: 2016-01-13
Packaged: 2018-05-13 17:45:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5711362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youcouldmakealife/pseuds/youcouldmakealife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“It’s one date, man,” Bradley says. “Do me a solid, Teresa’s been on me about it.”</p>
<p>“I’d really—” David says, prepares to finish with ‘rather not’, but Bradley’s making this exaggerated pouting face, the kind of ridiculous face Kiro would pull when David beat him at something. David doesn’t think he’s going to let it go. “Fine,” he says, finally. “When?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	recognition

Obviously David couldn’t keep his pace up. Two points a game, for the season, was 164 points, and that sort of points total hadn’t been seen in twenty years, when goaltending equipment was smaller, goaltenders themselves were smaller, and every team was scoring far more than they did now. David isn’t arrogant enough to believe he could singlehandedly overtake those obstacles, and that equation is overly simplistic, is based on him not missing a single game due to injury or illness, which unfortunately isn’t likely.

The point is, David isn’t getting his hopes up. Not just about somehow staying two points a game, or close, which he knows isn’t very likely, but winning anything, which Kiro butts right back into his head every time he tries to forcibly push it away.

As November nudges forward, David doesn’t keep up the points per game average, which is frustrating but unsurprising. He has a two game drought in which he doesn’t record a single point, and the media leaps on it like his awful run last year, like two games without a point means he’s finished. Thankfully Oleg breaks that with a beautiful goal off a pass from David to Bradley to Oleg. A secondary assist is worth just as much as a goal, when it comes down to it, and the game following that, David has a goal, a primary assist, and a secondary assist, as if he was trying to play some form of hockey bingo.

The media shuts up after that, at least as far as David’s aware.

He’s still holding the spot of first in the league, despite the drop in production, though there are players creeping up — there’s a player on Detroit only a point behind him, now, which makes him feel hunted, like if he underperforms he won’t just slip to second best, he’ll lose everything. David knows what second best feels like. Maybe that’s why he’s afraid.

He’s not letting fear stop him, though. That’s the definition of cowardice. His grandmother said if you were never afraid you couldn’t be brave, because bravery was facing something you’re scared of. She said a lot of things like that, things David thinks she picked up from books, but that one stayed with him, meant more than guys in the room scoffing like they weren’t afraid of anything. Maybe they weren’t, but that didn’t make them brave.

The line keeps working, enough that TSN calls them the hottest line in hockey. Dave sends him a clip of it. The sportscaster sounds a little surprised as he says it, starts with ‘No one could have expected’, which David is bothered by, but he knows Dave sent him the clip to make him happy, and it’s nice to be recognised. They say a lot of nice things about him, a lot about Oleg, so David sends Oleg the clip too, though for all he knows Oleg’s already seen it. 

The TSN guy was the most surprised about Bradley, that he’s keeping up. David was too. David doesn’t know Matthew Bradley — Matty, he insists on being called, though he’s twenty-three years old and it seems like the sort of name you’d outgrow by middle school — all that well. He was a high first round draft pick two years before David went second overall — David thinks he might have been tenth, but keeps forgetting to check — but until last season he bounced up and down from the minors, sometimes third line, sometimes fourth line. Last year he slotted into the second and stayed there, game improving as the season went on, and David hadn’t had a lot of chemistry with him when he was bouncing between lines himself, but then, David hadn’t played well with anyone then, not even Oleg, so that’s unsurprising.

Bradley had never been rude to him in the way of Benson and his compatriots — though he does seem to get along well with Benson — but they’d never really talked that much before the season either. That changes as the season continues, as they keep racking up the points. David hadn’t realised how much Bradley talked. The entire road trip they’ve been on he’s been trying to set David up with a friend of his girlfriend, and David hasn’t been able to deflect him yet.

“She’s totally gorgeous,” Bradley says.

“Are you supposed to say that about your girlfriend’s friend?” David asks.

Bradley laughs, like David was joking. “She’s smart, too,” he says. “Went to NYU.”

“I’m not really — ” David starts. “Dating,” he finishes, finally, when Bradley doesn’t look like he’s going to let it go.

“You don’t have a girlfriend, right?” Bradley says. “Some secret Canadian chick?”

“No,” David says.

“It’s one date, man,” Bradley says. “Do me a solid, Teresa’s been on me about it.”

“I’d really—” David says, prepares to finish with ‘rather not’, but Bradley’s making this exaggerated pouting face, the kind of ridiculous face Kiro would pull when David beat him at something. David doesn’t think he’s going to let it go. “Fine,” he says, finally. “When?”

*

When they get back to New York City, David has a date with Bradley’s girlfriend’s friend. Her name’s Samantha, and she really is very pretty, enough that David might have been able to figure out which person was her at the bar of the restaurant, even if Bradley hadn’t shown her a picture. She’s wearing heels, and when David introduces himself, he realises she’s taller than him, wearing them, that he’s looking up when he meets her eye. “Call me Sam,” she says, when he offers her a hand to shake, but David doesn’t, even in his own head.

Samantha talks a lot, just like Bradley. David isn’t judging or anything, he knows that he doesn’t talk a lot, that a lot of people talk more around him, like there’s space they have to fill up. Even Oleg talks more than David when they talk to one another, and the whole team jokes about how little Oleg talks, but when he talks you know you’d better listen, so David knows that means Oleg isn’t very talkative.

“I was never really big into hockey,” she says. “My brother was a Sabres fan, but,” she shrugs. “Teresa needs a hand to hold during games, she’s so nervous, and obviously Matty can’t do it, so.” She laughs, and David, after a moment, does as well.

David learns that she has a brother — the Sabres fan — and a sister, both younger. That she has a degree in anthropology, but she works in insurance, and that she doesn’t like it very much. “But whatever pays the student loans off, right?” she asks, and David, who has seven figures in the bank and wouldn’t have paid for university if he did go, nods hesitantly. That she met Teresa, Bradley’s fiance, in college, and that she started watching hockey after Teresa and Bradley started dating, mostly as moral support, but “Now I’m an Isles fan, I guess,” she says, and laughs. She laughs a lot, in a way that reminds him of how often Jake does, but her laughter sounds nervous, forced. “You’re amazing this year.”

“Thank you,” David says. “We have a good group.”

David pays for dinner, and then insists on paying for her cab. She argues at first, but lets him in the end.

“Get home safe,” David tells her.

“Yeah,” she says. “Hey, good luck this season.”

“Thank you,” David says. 

*

“How’d the date go?” Bradley asks, next practice.

“I don’t think I was her type,” David says, cautious.

Oleg’s looking over with an expression David can’t figure out.

“Not her type?” Bradley says. “Dude, she’s like totally in love with the way you play. Not to mention the whole — ” he gestures vaguely at David, and David frowns, resists the urge to ask what Bradley’s referring to. “I bet she’d say yes if you asked her out again.”

His voice has that hint of a plea it did last time, the kind that means he isn’t going to give up.

“Bradley, I need to speak to you,” Oleg cuts in.

“We’re talking about this,” Bradley says, pointing at David, but he doesn’t bring it up, not during practice, not after, not at all. David waits for Oleg after practice, because he’s always the last guy out. He almost doesn’t ask when Oleg gives him a nod in farewell, because he isn’t sure he wants the answer, but he can’t leave it alone, in case the answer is what he doesn’t want to hear.

“Did you tell Bradley about—” David starts, doesn’t know how to finish the question. He’s never told Oleg anything, though he believes Oleg knows. For all he knows Oleg told Bradley girls would only distract him during his breakout year, for all he knows that’s what Oleg thinks. “Me,” he finally says, feeling hot all over, when Oleg frowns at him.

“Of course not,” Oleg says, sharp, and David can exhale.

*

They play the Panthers in Sunrise a few days after the date, and David wonders if Jake’s going to talk to him at all, or if maybe text is the sum total of their relationship. He honestly doesn’t know what he’d prefer. He tenses every time his phone buzzes, enough that he gets annoyed when Kiro sends him a text, because he isn’t Jake asking if David wants to do something when he’s in Florida or Jake telling him he was going to stay away.

Jake does ask to get together, texts David the day before, though it’s before the game, a lunch that doesn’t conflict with either of their practice schedules or pregame, a narrow window of time. David is simultaneously annoyed that Jake thinks he needs to take precautions like that, and respectful that he’s trying to stay — professional isn’t the word, but something close to it. He doesn’t feel disappointed. 

He tells Jake about the date with Samantha over lunch at a quiet restaurant not too far from the arena. He’s the only one David’s told about it, other than Bradley and Oleg, who weren’t exactly _told_. David isn’t really sure why he’s telling Jake, except maybe because he thinks Jake would find it funny. Jake laughs at some points, shakes his head at other points.

“That poor girl,” Jake says, after David’s done his story.

David frowns.

“I mean,” Jake says. “I bet she liked you. I bet she was wondering what she did wrong.”

“She didn’t do anything wrong,” David says.

“I know,” Jake says. “I know she didn’t.”

“So what are you trying to say?” David asks, frustrated.

“You’re just—” Jake says, then goes uncharacteristically quiet. 

David waits for a moment, then gets impatient. “I’m what?” he asks.

“Never mind,” Jake says, which is probably the most frustrating statement in the English language.

“I’m what, Jake?” David asks.

Jake shrugs a little. “Hard to get?” he says, like it’s a question. He laughs as he says it, like it’s funny. “Hard to get over?” Still a question, though he doesn’t laugh this time.

“I’m sorry?” David asks. He didn’t mean to phrase it like a question, but it comes out like that anyway.

Jake shakes his head. “No, sorry,” he says. “I’m being dumb.”

“I don’t think you’re being dumb,” David says. 

Jake smiles, just a little. “Bradley still trying to set you up?”

“I think Kurmazov said something to him,” David says. “He hasn’t mentioned it, at least.”

“I like Kurmazov,” Jake says.

“You like everyone,” David says, can’t help smiling at him.

“True,” Jake laughs. “I like Kurmazov extra, though.”

“You haven’t even met him,” David says, then frowns, wonders if they have met, if Oleg’s said something to Jake, or Jake to Oleg. “Have you?”

“Nah,” Jake says. “But it sounds like he’s looking after you.”

“I can look after myself,” David argues, but he’s not really sure that’s true. He’s made bad decisions. He’s sitting across from one. 

He pushes the thought down. He doesn’t like to think of Jake that way, even in his head, even when he should. 

“I know,” Jake says. “Just glad you don’t have to.”

David realises, with a start, that rings as true as his protest rang hollow. “When’d you get smart?” he asks, then internally winces at how that must sound.

Jake doesn’t look offended, though, just shrugs. “I think a lot,” he says. “You know. About you. So.”

David can feel heat creep up the back of his neck, flush his cheeks. He looks at the table. “Oh,” he says, when Jake doesn’t continue. 

“I’m going to go,” Jake says. “This was. This was a shitty idea, so.”

“No,” David says, looks up. “It wasn’t. I don’t — it wasn’t a shitty idea.”

“Okay,” Jake says. “I’m going to go, though. Go easy on us tonight?”

“I don’t know how to do that,” David says, and Jake, of course, laughs.

“I know,” he says, so soft David almost misses it, and David supposes that’s true too.


End file.
